Nyssa's Canary
by The Sacred and Profane
Summary: How Nyssa al-Ghul meets, nurtures, and falls in love with Sara Lance.


Nyssa's Canary

AN: I own nothing in this story. Please R&R.

Nyssa al-Ghul could hardly recall a time when her hands did not hold a blade, or a bow, or nothing at all, clashing with a smooth strike to nerves or tendons. She was to be the prime example of her father's methods, his will, his right hand and it was a role she filled as best she was able. Nearly two full decades in League service since her father deemed her old enough to carry out solo missions, Nyssa was now everything her father had asked her to become.

She accepted her latest mission with a respectful bow, the gleam in her father's eyes worth more than any presents he had lavished on her during her lifetime. It was what she craved, a small smile masked by her League cloth.

Taking leave of her father, Nyssa embarked to the rough seas of the Dragon's Triangle, spotting the wreckage of the Amazo. Nyssa directed her fellow brothers and sisters of the League to scour every bit, her own path taking her towards the island. Her eyes soon caught the footprints and bloodstains near the shore. The path of this wounded enigma took her barely a mile further, to a cave mouth.

There, bloodied and half-dead, a young woman lay, a gun in one hand, her arm trembling as she pointed it towards Nyssa.

"Stay...stay back!"

Nyssa took in the pale tint to her skin, the deep gash in her left side, the bullet-hole in her right side, and the general malnourishment of her figure before meeting the determined, clear gaze of this mysterious woman.

Nodding towards the woman, Nyssa set her blade and bow down. "I'm not going to hurt you. What is your name?"

The gun lowers a fraction, but those blue eyes are still clear as day.

"Sara."

/

The gun's like an anchor in her hand, her vision blurring a bit around the edges as she answers the woman and it's all she can do to just breathe her next breath.

So she focuses on her, the way she was so still yet so alert reminding her of Shado. Maybe that's what made her answer. She had survived the wreck of the Gambit, survived Ivo and his men, survived the bastard shooting her and the fall into the ocean, she could survive giving this woman her name.

The gun falls out of her hand several seconds later, her body following it's descent to the ground only for it to collide with another. The woman's holding her, bringing her to her feet, those dark eyes locking with hers once more. There was a promise in those eyes as she felt her body supported by the woman.

"You will survive this."

Sara wants to laugh, wants to point towards her wound and what feels like the buckets of blood she's lost, wants to tell this woman she's not a survivor, but her vision finally buckles, the world going black, like the woman's eyes.

When she opens them again she's resting on the softest bed in her life, clean bandages and an IV in her left arm, stitches mending her torn flesh.

"You are finally awake."

The woman is at the entrance to the bedroom, a red nightgown, and quite sheer, Sara notices, her only clothing.

"You saved me."

"That I did, Sara. My name is Nyssa, Nyssa al-Ghul."

"Why did you save me?"

"Because you are curious and you are a survivor. I've no doubt you have quite the story to tell and I would like to hear it, but for now focus on regaining your strength."

A sudden rumble from Sara's middle made her blush, Nyssa's face softening into a small smile. "Got anything to eat?"

/

Nyssa gently took Sara's right arm, mindful of the bandages and the still healing wounds, leading her out towards the terrace. It was one of her favorite areas of the mansion her father had provided for her upon her third successful mission and now, a good three weeks into Sara's recovery, it was time to show Sara Nandar Parbat in it's full splendor.

She was not disappointed as she watched Sara's expression change, those blue eyes of hers widening, her jaw dropping just a tad, her entire body going still at the sight beyond the terrace.

"It's...wonderful..."

"Beautiful," Nyssa murmured, her eyes not once darting towards the place of her birth. Sara turned to look at her, Nyssa swiftly ensuring that she was now looking towards the town nestled in the highest habitable reaches of the Himalayas.

"Thanks for showing me this," Sara said. Nyssa nodded, looking towards the blond once more.

"It is a sight that is always present in my mind. What I fight for, what all my fellow League members strive for."

"It's your home, it makes sense."

"It's not just a home, Sara. You are still not fully healed but when you are, I will take you into the town proper, show you what this place and the others like it around the globe symbolizes, and then you will understand."

"Can I go back to my family?"

"If you wish, but you must heal first."

Nyssa's eyes widen a moment later as Sara hugs her, overcoming her body's urge to immediately strike or hit, her right fist tightening for a moment before she stops clenching it.

"Thank you Nyssa. After Ivo shot me I thought I'd never have anyone care for me again."

Nyssa nods, eyes closing as she returns the hug as best she could, again mindful of the injuries, taking in all of this curious American and her mending body.

"You are welcome, Sara."

/

Fully healed two months after Nyssa showed her the view of Nanda Parbat, Sara was currently sweating, pants escaping her chapped lips as she looked towards her instructor.

"Again!"

Her fellow trainees weren't faring much better, but no one voiced a complaint at the instruction, tired legs starting to pump as they began yet another circuit around the city. As she ran, Sara looked for Nyssa's dark eyes watching her. She could have sworn she saw them during the last run, but she couldn't see them as she rounded the eastern well.

Her muscles screamed at her to stop, her lungs echoing the complaint, but Sara ignored them.

This was for Nyssa, all of the early morning exercises, the monotonous slapping of water and katas, everything was to show her savior gratitude for plucking her from death's door.

Bullshit, she thinks, in a tone not unlike her older sister's voice.

She's not doing this for gratitude or paying back a debt and she knows it. Has known it since the second night of her stay in Nyssa's room, the woman holding her after a nightmare, her voice soothing, bringing her away from the Island, from Ivo, back to the silk sheets and downy covers, back to the strong arms encircling her.

She had tried to fight the feelings that welled up in her when she was around Nyssa, but had given up after the terrace.

Now if only she could actually tell Nyssa how she felt.

Various plans and scenes run around in her head for the confession, each one growing more ridiculous until she finishes, bowing before the instructor. The older man returned the bow, motioning for her dismissal.

There were a few of her fellow trainees done before her, some nodding her way, one scowling, but Sara barely paid attention to them as she made her way to the hut she called her own. It wasn't much, a bare cot, a simple bucket for a toilet, one chair, one table, but it was heaven to her tired limbs. Spying the doorway a few yards ahead, Sara was stopped by a familiar touch on her right shoulder.

"You are remarkable."

Sara turned to look into those gorgeous dark eyes, blushing and thankful that her entire body was red from exertion. "I'm sweaty and exhausted."

Nyssa smirked just a bit as she replied. "A bath then."

/

"I could have done this myself," Sara mutters, but says nothing as Nyssa brings a marble cup of the soothing warm water down on her back.

"Of course, but this is no ordinary bath, Sara. It's a balm for a deserving initiate. The training will only get harder from here."

Nyssa let the silence from her remark hang in the air, waiting for Sara to speak and controlling her urge to kiss the nude blond resting against her chest. She was halfway through her meditative chants before Sara spoke.

"Was it this hard for you?"

"Harder."

Sara's hand is trailing along her hip, along the white scar marring the flesh there. "Did your training give you this?"

"Yes," Nyssa murmured, cheeks flushing red as Sara looked from the scar to her eyes.

They glimmered with tears for a moment before Sara darted forward, her lips brushing against hers, her arms wrapping tightly around her. Nyssa returns the kiss and the embrace, bringing her as close as possible.

"I love you, Nyssa," Sara murmured.

All of Nyssa's lessons on control and honing the mind flee and she can only nod, her eyes watering as she initiates another kiss, breaking apart to murmur in the barest of spaces between them.

"I love you as well, Sara."

/

Sara's training is completed a year later, the official ceremony for her full initiation into the League just a single day away. Naturally there was a celebration among the initiates who had passed, Sara barely remembering everything she consumed or drank as the night wore on. Staggering into Nyssa's home, her home now that she had completed her instruction, Sara found herself walking towards the bedroom, falling face first onto the bed, a pleased sigh escaping her.

A hand grabbed her hair several moments later, yanking hard, a blade against her throat.

Even inebriated, Sara's mind went through the proper course of action, her body following. A firm strike against the upper thigh, her attacker buckling. Grabbing the wrist follows, throwing the enemy over the shoulder. A strike to the wrist holding the weapon, a thigh along the throat, cutting off oxygen.

She looks down at the face struggling to breathe, her mind supplying a name.

Abis Mal, one of the many failed initiates.

His eyes bore into her and she lifts her left thigh, allowing him to breathe.

"Just...end it...I have no place anymore."

She hesitates and that's enough for him to reverse their positions.

His hands are around her throat a moment later, her world spinning and collapsing like a black hole before the life-stealing pressure vanishes, her assailant crying out in pain as an arrow seems to sprout from his shoulder.

A bare, familiar, hand yanks him up by the arrow, another jammed into his middle.

Sara manages to get on her knees, staring at the pure rage on Nyssa's face, her eyes appearing darker to her reeling vision, Nyssa's voice coming clear as day to her ears as she dragged the man over to the nearest wall.

"Swine! You dare to touch her? Dare to injure her?!"

Another arrow is jammed through the man, this time into his gut. Nyssa's knife is unsheathed, the gold guard gleaming in the soft candlelight bathing the room. Nyssa twists the arrow in the man's stomach before slicing above his left ear with the knife.

Sara's on her feet by this point, tottering towards Nyssa.

"Don't-" she manages to get out before she's suddenly in Nyssa's arms, the knife in her right hand.

"I will not kill him, dear one. But you now see what we're fighting against, the type of human excrement that must be purged from this world. Strike true, Sara, and end his wretched existence."

The knife felt heavier than the gun had been, but Sara nodded at Nyssa's whispered words in her ear, those words all she focused on as she stabbed. Body trembling, she removed the knife and drove it in again and again until her legs gave out, Nyssa catching her.

Nyssa's solid, familiar presence against hers is the last thing Sara feels before she passes out.

/

It's two hours before Sara's ceremony and Nyssa has her in the bath once again. Running her fingers through the wet, blond hair, Nyssa nuzzles lightly against the back of Sara's neck, breathing in her scent.

"No one shall harm you within these walls again, dear one, I promise."

She feels Sara's body start to tremble, Nyssa bringing her in closer. "I...killed-"

"Shh, shh, it's alright. He didn't deserve to live. After today, you will have proof that the people we are removing from the world are no better than he is."

She wouldn't stop trembling against her, Nyssa's brow furrowing as she turned Sara around to face her, a hand going to her right cheek, gently caressing her face. "Nyssa...what am I becoming?"

"You are becoming nothing, Sara. You are who you have always been, a survivor, a warrior born."

"Am I going to have to kill again?"

Nyssa sighed at that, kissing lightly along Sara's neck. "Yes, but it is not something to trouble yourself with. I will always be here for you, my dear one. Do not be afraid of what is to come."

She feels Sara nodding along with her words, returning her embrace and her kisses. Beaming at her lover, Nyssa appraises Sara's nude, wet, figure, tracing along the scar on her left side.

"You are ready. Ready to take up a new name with the League."

Sara's eyes are the most vivid Nyssa could recall them being, the sight making her breath stall a bit, lost in their beauty.

"What's Arabic for canary, Nyssa?"

Sara's voice is a light murmur against her ear, Nyssa soon hauling her off the cool tile of the bath and holding her in the air before bringing her back down to her lap, Sara cuddling against her. Nyssa moves her lips to Sara's right ear as she whispers the answer.

"Ta-Er Sah-Fer." Pulling apart to look into Sara's eyes once more, Nyssa smiles the brightest smile she can recall giving anyone. "_My_ _Ta-Er Sah-Fer_."


End file.
